The notion that the Regent would continue Mr. Pitt and his friends in
office was rapidly dissipated during the progress of these discussions.
The Household Bill, alluded to in one of Mr. Grenville's letters, gave
deep offence to His Royal Highness; and from the moment that part of the
plan was disclosed, there was no longer any disguise about the fact that
the Prince had not only made up his mind to dismiss the Ministers, but
that the list of the incoming Administration was actually settled, and
ready for use. The object of the Household Bill was to confide to the
Queen the care of the King's person, and the disposition of the royal
household, which would have the effect of placing at Her Majesty's
control the patronage of four hundred places; while the Regent was to
possess no power whatever over any office, reversion, or pension. This
appeared to the Prince and his allies a monstrous proposition,
calculated to introduce "weakness, disorder, and insincerity into every
branch of political business;" to "separate the Court from the State;"
to "disconnect the authority to command service from the power of
animating it by reward;" and to impose on the Regent "all the invidious
duties of the kingly station, without the means of softening them to the
public by any one act of grace, favour, or benignity."
In these poised and melodious sentences (said to have been written by
Burke) may be recognized the policy of the master spirit that raised the
storm which was to overwhelm Ministers. When the moment came, however,
at which it should have burst--Pitt's motion for the Address--Fox was
absent. "Fox is gone to Bath," says Mr. Grenville. "Whether he is very
ill, as some say, or wants to shirk the discussion about Mrs.
Fitzherbert, as others assert, I know not."
This business of Mrs. Fitzherbert, of which we hear something in these
letters, was suspended like a sword over the heads of the royal
Opposition; and whenever it threatened to descend, they endeavoured to
escape from it by avoiding the discussion, or to avert it by abating
their violence. The rumour, however, which ascribed Fox's absence on
this occasion to that cause was certainly unfounded. On the 19th of
January, he made his motion for limiting the continuance of the
restrictions; and on the 26th he was ill at Bath, where he remained for
some weeks in a precarious state of health. His loss was severely felt
by his party. Ministers were triumphant in both Houses. The incidental
shocks they experienced from the vibrations of that class of persons
designated by Mr. Grenville as "_conscientious_ friends," and from the
defection of the _rats_, had been completely recovered in the final
majorities of Lords and Commons; and although Fox may not have thought
it prudent on some occasions to enhance the inevitable defeat of the
Prince's followers by assisting at their discomfiture, it is unlikely
that even the dread of a debate on Mrs. Fitzherbert would have kept him
away at this critical juncture.
While these discussions were going on, always ending in fluctuating
majorities for Pitt, the Prince of Wales and his brother,
notwithstanding the dissipation in which they indulged, were
indefatigable in their efforts to cultivate popularity. Thus writes Lord
Bulkeley:
The Princes go on in their usual style, both keeping open houses,
and employing every means in their power to gain proselytes,
attending the Beefsteak Clubs, Freemason meetings, &c., and will
probably very soon attend the parochial meetings of Lord John
Townshend's Committee in Westminster. Notwithstanding all this, the
Parliament still continues steadily to Mr. Pitt, which, considering
the looseness of morals and of the times, does the members great
credit. * * * The Duke of York never misses a night at Brookes's,
where the hawks pluck his feathers unmercifully, and have reduced
him to the vowels I. O. U. The Prince likewise attends very often,
and has taken kindly to play.
General Cuninghame appears to have disappointed the expectations of his
friends at this period, and, although present in the House on the 19th,
did not vote. It was the next thing to ratting, and seems to have been
regarded in that light by Lord Bulkeley.
General Cuninghame has been blowing hot and cold in his language
here, but has not voted, not even last night, when he appeared for
the first time in the House. I have had a letter from the Duke of
Dorset, complaining of his conduct in not resigning his seat, _as
his conscience troubled him_.
No man had so keen a scent for _rats_ as Lord Bulkeley, and he was
generally in advance of his party in detecting them.
Thurlow and Loughborough were both ill at this time ("which," says Sir
William Young, with a touch of sarcastic humour, "will much shorten the
progress of the Regency Bill in the Lords"); and on the 2nd of February,
when Mr. Grenville, in his capacity of Speaker, attended at the bar of
the House of Peers to hear the Commission under the Great Seal read,
Thurlow was unable to attend, and Lord Bathurst officiated for him. The
night before, Thurlow declared, as reported by his physician, that "if
he were ten times worse, he'd go, by G--;" his physician, however,
overruled him; and the obstruction of his presence being thus
fortunately removed, it was anticipated that the progress of the Bill
through the Lords would be so rapid as to place the Regent on the throne
in a fortnight. Active preparations were, consequently, set on foot for
settling the new Administration. Amongst the other great situations,
Ireland was offered to the Duke of Northumberland, who declined it, and
then to Lord Spencer, who accepted it, with Pelham for his secretary.
Ireland was a considerable item in the calculations of the Opposition.
"The Prince and the Opposition," writes Lord Bulkeley, "have great hopes
of a riot in their favour in the Parliament of Ireland." Some such
result was to be apprehended from the temper of the people, and the
adverse views they took of the Regency question; although a true sense
of their own independence ought to have shown them that there were
national objections against allowing the Prince to indemnify himself by
the use of the royal prerogatives in Ireland for the restraints which
were put upon him in England. The object to which, under these difficult
circumstances, Lord Buckingham and Mr. Grenville directed their
attention, was to assimilate, as nearly as possible, the Regency Bills
in both countries, so as to prevent the occurrence of so great an
anomaly as that of having a Regent whose powers should be strictly
limited in the one kingdom, and who should, at the same time, be
invested with unrestricted powers in the other. The Parliament of
Ireland possessed the unquestionable right of deciding the Regency in
their own way, leaving the legal validity of the act for subsequent
consideration; and as it was understood that the Opposition intended to
move an Address to the Prince, which there was reason to believe they
would be able to carry, calling upon His Royal Highness to assume the
Government of Ireland unconditionally during the term of His Majesty's
illness, the position of Lord Buckingham had become peculiarly
embarrassing. What course should be taken in the event of such an
Address being carried? This question is anxiously discussed in numerous
communications between Lord Buckingham and Mr. Grenville and other
members of the Government. The predicament was so strange, and involved
constitutional considerations of such importance, as to give the most
serious disquietude to the Administration. The first expedient thought
of was to delay the proceedings of the Irish Parliament, by adjournment,
or any other available means, till after the Regent had been appointed
in England, provided the motion for the Address could be successfully
resisted in the first instance. But as it was almost certain the
Administration would be beaten on that motion, it remained to be
determined whether Lord Buckingham, in that event, should refuse to
transmit the Address to His Royal Highness. Upon the propriety of so
extreme a measure Mr. Grenville entertained some doubts in the
beginning. By refusing to transmit the Address, the Lord-Lieutenant
would clearly put himself in the way as an obstacle to that mode of
providing for the emergency which the two Houses of Parliament were
determined to adopt; or, on the other hand, by sending it he would make
himself, in some degree, a party to a request by which His Royal
Highness was asked to do an act which he, Lord Buckingham, held His
Royal Highness to be precluded by law from doing. Such was the dilemma
as it presented itself to the mind of Mr. Grenville. One escape from it
was, to forward the Address, accompanied by a representation from Lord
Buckingham of his own views of its illegality. Another was, to resign.
In the meanwhile, the projects of the Opposition in England were checked
by the gratifying accounts from Kew. The King was visibly improving, and
hopes began to be entertained that there might be no necessity for a
Regency after all. The letters of Mr. Grenville, reverting to the
opening of the Parliament, trace the progress of these circumstances in
detail.